Night safety for outdoor exercisers, e.g., joggers, pedestrians and cyclists, is an ongoing concern. Most people exercise outdoors either early in the morning before going to work or in the evening or at night after returning from work. In crowded urban environments, outdoor exercisers must frequently share the roads with motorists. Dawn and dusk are periods in which motorist's visibility is notoriously poor. Accordingly, exercisers must take extra precautions to ensure that they are visible to motorists.
In recent years, many exercisers have begun wearing bright or fluorescent colored clothing and/or passive reflectors. However, because these are purely reflective elements, it is necessary for them to be illuminated by an external light source, such as the beam of a motorists headlight, in order for them to function.
There are a several patents directed to caps having light sources attached to their brims. Some patents include caps having external, directed light sources attached to their brims. See for example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,406,040 and U.S. Pat. No. 5,741,060. The purpose of having light sources on these hats is to enhance the user's visibility so that the user can perform a desired task. However, these hats are not well suited for exercise activities such as jogging, walking or cycling because of the bulky nature of the light source attachment mechanisms. In addition, although they do emit light, they are not designed to make the wearer more visible in low light conditions.
There are still other illuminated caps that employ decorative lighting. For example, U.S. Pat. No. D318,338 includes a light source disposed at the center of the crown of the cap. U.S. Pat. No. 5,510,961 discloses a cap having several LEDs disposed along the perimeter of the brim. Neither of these patents is well suited to making the wearer more visible during low light situations or to providing large areas of illumination.
In recent years, athletic shoe manufacturers have developed a variety of shoes having illuminated regions. Some athletic shoes include illuminated portions on the shoe upper. Other athletic shoes contain illuminated portions in the heel. While still other athletic shoes contain illuminated regions in the instep portion of the sole. Typically, the light sources for these shoes are activated each time the wearer's foot makes contact with a surface and they remain active for a very limited duration (strobe, blink or flash). Thus, the wearer has extremely limited control over the duration of illumination.